Lebara SIM Only Plans & Bundles: With International Calls From £10/Month

Lebara Mobile offers 30-day SIM-only plans and Pay As You Go bundles from £10/month with inclusive international phone calls.

In the UK, Lebara Mobile is a specialist provider of international phone calls. Customers choosing one of Lebara’s SIM-only deals or Pay As You Go bundles will receive an inclusive allowance of international minutes, along with the normal allowance of UK minutes, texts and mobile data.

Customers on Lebara Mobile will have access to 4G coverage from the Vodafone network. There are a range of special offers available on Lebara such as £10 of free credit when you transfer your phone number in to the network and 10% off all top-ups if you’re a student.

In this article, we review Lebara Mobile’s SIM-only offering including the 30-day plans, bundles and offers that are available on the network.

Bundles & Plans

If you’re joining Lebara Mobile, there are two types of price plan you’re able to choose from:

SIM Only Deals: This is an online-only 30-day rolling plan where you’ll get an allowance of UK & international minutes along with text messages and data. Payment will be taken automatically for your plan every 30 days on Lebara SIM Only.

Pay As You Go Bundles: Lebara’s Pay As You Go bundles give you a little more flexibility compared to the SIM Only plans. Once again, you’ll buy a 30-day allowance of UK & international minutes along with text messages and mobile data. However, you’ll also have some flexibility to change back to traditional Pay As You Go, or to stop buying a bundle where necessary.

In the following section, we’ll review each of these two options in more detail.

SIM Only Deals

For most people, getting a SIM Only Deal will be the best value way of using Lebara Mobile. You’ll get an allowance of international minutes which can be used for calling 41 countries. You’ll also get unlimited UK minutes, unlimited UK texts and an allowance of 4G mobile data for use in the UK and Europe.

With a SIM Only Deal, your allowances will automatically renew every 30 days. Payment will be taken for the following month’s usage from your registered credit card, debit card or PayPal account.

Unlike on many other networks, there’s no need to undergo a credit check when taking out a SIM-only contract with Lebara. The contract works on a pre-paid basis so it isn’t possible for you to run up additional charges outside of your allowance (you’ll need to top-up your SIM card with additional credit before you’re able to run up any other charges).

Pay As You Go Bundles

If you want a little more flexibility, Lebara Mobile also offers a range of 30-day Pay As You Go bundles. These bundles work in a very similar way to Lebara’s SIM-only deals except that you don’t necessarily need to renew the bundle automatically every month. If you don’t renew your bundle, you’ll move over to traditional Pay As You Go rates.

Unfortunately, this added flexibility means you’ll generally get smaller allowances for the same monthly price (e.g. less data and fewer international minutes to a more restricted list of 39 countries, etc).

International Calls

The following table shows a list of countries that are included within Lebara Mobile’s international minutes allowance:

Destination

Included Within International Minutes?

SIM Only Deals

Pay As You Go Bundles

Australia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Austria

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Belgium

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Bulgaria

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Canada

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

China

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Croatia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Cyprus

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Czech Republic

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Denmark

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Estonia

✔ Yes*

✔ Yes*

Finland

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

France

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Germany

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Greece

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Hong Kong

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Hungary

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Iceland

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

India

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Ireland

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Israel

✔ Yes

✘ No

Italy

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Korea; Republic of (South)

✔ Yes

✘ No

Latvia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Lithuania

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Luxembourg

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Malaysia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Netherlands

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

New Zealand

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Norway

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Poland

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Portugal

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Romania

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Singapore

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Slovakia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Slovenia

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Spain

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Sweden

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Switzerland

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

Thailand

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

United States

✔ Yes

✔ Yes

* Excludes calls to Top Connect Mobile in Estonia.

The inclusive international minutes on Lebara Mobile’s SIM Only plans can be used to call people in 41 countries. With a Pay As You Go bundle, there’s a slightly reduced list of 39 countries (minus Israel and South Korea which are only available on the SIM Only plans).

Lebara Mobile Offers

There are currently a number of special offers available for customers joining Lebara Mobile on a SIM-only or Pay As You Go basis.

If you’re a student with a NUS TOTEM/Extra card, you can get a 10% discount on Lebara Mobile bundles and top-ups. Simply enter your NUS ID in the promotion code box when purchasing your SIM-only deal or bundle.

Handsets

With Lebara Mobile’s SIM-only deals and Pay As You Go bundles, you’ll need to provide your own unlocked smartphone to use with the service. This can either be a mobile phone that you already have, or it can be a brand new smartphone that you’ve purchased SIM-free and unlocked.

If you’d like a brand new smartphone on which you can use your Lebara SIM-only tariff, there are a range of potential retailers listed here. We’d recommend having a look at handsets from the Moto G family as they tend to be fairly powerful and well-priced mid-range devices.

Tethering

It should be possible to tether on Lebara’s SIM Only deals and Pay As You Go bundles. However, this is not recommended by Lebara. According to an FAQ posted on their website:

Tethering is something that we don’t advise since our data plans are design to be use with our sim cards not to be shared. You can share data if your device lets you, but if you have connection issues or other issues related to the tethering, we won’t be able to assist you.

International Roaming

If you’re travelling within Europe to another EU/EEA country, you can use your normal SIM Only or bundle allowance (subject to a fair usage policy of 4.2GB on the £10 tariff, 6.2GB on the £15 tariff and 8.3GB on the £20 tariff). This is described in the fair usage policy on this page.

If you’re travelling outside of Europe, you’ll pay substantially more (typically up to £3.49/minute, 49p/text and £14.99/MB).

Keeping Your Phone Number

If you’re joining Lebara Mobile to take advantage of their SIM Only deals or Pay As You Go bundles, it’s a straightforward process to keep your current phone number.

You should start by ordering your SIM-only deal or Pay As You Go bundle from the Lebara Mobile website. Once you’ve done that, you should contact your old mobile network to ask for a PAC Code. It’s a legal requirement for your old mobile network to provide you with a PAC Code within 2 hours of your request.

When your new SIM card arrives in the post from Lebara, it will initially have a temporary phone number assigned to it. Contact Lebara Mobile Customer Services by dialling 5588 on your Lebara Mobile SIM card (or 0870 075 5588 from any other phone). Give them your PAC Code over the phone and they’ll then arrange the transfer of your phone number (normally for the next working day). You’ll also receive £10 of free credit if you’re eligible for the offer (we recommend buying a plan or topping up your SIM card prior to the call to make sure you qualify for the offer).

Hi Blase,
Thanks for your comment. I believe the international minutes can indeed be used for both: a list of excluded phone number ranges is listed on the Lebara Mobile website (the main exclusion being Top Connect Mobile in Estonia).
Ken

Blasesaid:

Hi, this looks good but I got question regarding this quote: ” You’ll get an allowance of international minutes which can be used for calling 41 countries.”
So does those minutes allow you to call only landlines or only mobiles or both? I like the £15 bundle a lot it would suit my needs perfect. But I need to know how can I use these international minutes before I commit to try it. I ring mobiles in Poland so if it would turn out to be landlines only it’s a no go for me. My current O2 sim gives me 100 minutes for landlines and mobiles any country in Europe after top up of £15 and nothing else to use in UK just plain pay as you go rates. Please reply swiftly as all above offers for sim only end on 30th April (I checked that in t&c’s for this offer on Lebara website).

Dawnsaid:

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About Ken

My passion is helping people to get the most out of their mobile phone. I've been blogging at Ken's Tech Tips since 2005.

Aside from writing about mobile technology, I have an interest in software development, digital marketing and physics. Outside of the blog, I work with numerous technology companies helping them to market their product to consumers. Find out more.